The Early Church agreed with me on Soul Sleep

1 Clement casually refers to the dead as Asleep just like the New Testament.  Polycarp’s Epistle to the Philippians makes no reference to any After Life, only the promise of Resurrection, same with the Rule of Faith and Old Roman Symbol.  

Justin Martyr in Dialogue with Trypho 80:9 says that those who teach you to go to Heaven when you Die and deny the Bodily Resurrection are not Christians.  Defenders of the Intermediate State insist the point of this is only the later and the former is only wrong when it’s paired with the later. But to me the point is that they innately go together.

There are two Justin Quotes they then cite as in support of the Intermediate State, both are also from Dialogue with Trypho, one in chapter 5 and the other in chapter 6.  In both cases it is the other person not Justin himself talking, but still someone who is almost right just getting his Soul/Spirit distinction terminology off.  The Spirit Returns to God when the Body dies, but the Soul or Psyche in Greek is where Conciseness lies and is only awake when Body and Spirit are united. 

I think chapter 5 is using the word “place” in an abstract sense.  The righteous may be sleeping soundly then the unrighteous but both are still asleep.  The title of chapter 5 is “the Soul is not in itself immortal”.

What Justin says in response critiques the Platonism of their perspective.

Then chapter 18 and 20 of the First Apology are quoted.  Chapter 18 is about him reminding the Pagans and Philosophers reading what they already believe.  And in Chapter 20 all he conceded Christian belief to have in common with that is the word “sensation”.  In neither of these is explaining the Christian view of the Afterlife the objective  Again my view is that the Soul is Asleep not Dead.

Tatian who was influenced by Justin but also became heavily Platonized still held to the Soul not being Immortal. In Address to the Greek Chapter XIII even the Souls of believers are Dissolved until the Resurrection.

Athenogaras in On The Resurrection Chapter XVI lays out a Soul Sleep view quite clearly.

Now I’ve seen Athenogaros quoted in support of Soul Sleep using A Plea for The Christians chapter 31.   On The Resurrection is what he wrote specifically to clarify what he saw as the Christians on these issues, this apology written to a Pagan Audience naturally runs a greater risk of being misunderstood.

Yet still he speaks only of living a better life after this one, and calls it Heavenly not located in Heaven.  He says we will be near God because that’s what New Jerusalem will be.  

Marcu Minucius Felix in a dialogue titled Octavius Chapter XXXIV  presents Soul Sleep as the presumed common opinion of all Christians.

The first version of an intermediate state to emerge among Christians wasn’t about anyone going to “Heaven” but about Abraham’s Bosom being part of or right next to Hades deep inside the Earth.  This is the more logical conclusion to draw about Abraham’s Bosom when you take the Luke 16 Parable literally.  

We see this in Irenaeus Against Heresies 5.31.2 and the Discourse to the Greek Concerning Hades often attributed to Hippolytus.  Tertullian mostly followed them but had only the Martyrs go right to Heaven when they died.  Even Origen, the first real enemy of Soul Sleep, had to admit that Biblically Paradise is located within the Universe not outside of it, even Garden being moved to the ‘Third Heaven”  traditions would have still originally mean within the Universe, Heaven just meant the Sky and Outer Space to the Ancients.

The people who kept believing in Soul Sleep while the Greek and Latin Churches started moving away from it were various Semitic Christians.  It was Arab Christians Origen went after.  And then Aramaic Christians continued to teach Soul Sleep into the 4th and 5th Centuries like Apharat, Ephrem and Narsai.

Baptists are the most Ironically named type of Christian

I often get the sense that Secular people who don’t fully get internal Christian disagreement assume those called Baptists must be the ones with the most extreme views on Baptism.  But actually the difference in how Baptism is practiced by Baptists and before them Anabaptists that caused others to call them by those names is directly a result of seeing Water Baptism as not metaphysically important.

To a large extent what they actually see as most important is the belief in Separation of Church and State and the autonomy of the Local Congregation.  Now those are values they nominally share with Congregationalists, but there is a perception that this was watered down in the Congregationalists when they started wielding actual state power during the English Revolution and in the New England colonies.

I’m not a Landmark Baptist in the strictest sense, I certainly don’t think there needs to be an unbroken continuity of Believers Baptisms or “True Churches” going back to the Apostles.  And I disagree with Novatianism and Donatism.  But I do believe people who informally practiced Low Church Congregational Polity worship in defiance of the mainstream Church and State Authorities have always existed to some extent, sometimes they were also correct on Baptism and sometimes they weren’t.

The first Church was the Jerusalem Church, Eusebius' list of supposed Monepiscpal Bishops of Jerusalem up to the Bar Kokhba revolt is 15, 15 is barely over 100 years and when the first two he definitely has spanned all of the First Century AD. He’s clearly trying to impose Episcopal Polity onto a Church that didn’t have. I think all of the last half of that list were people still alive when Hadrian banned Jews from the City. 

Epiphanius of Salamis conceded the Nazarenes of Aleppo and Bashan descended from that Jerusalem Church even though he was critical of their practices.  These Nazarenes were certainly Credo-Baptists given they continued the practice of Infant Circumcision.

Philadelphia has no traditional list of Bishops till Nicaea.  For Caesarea after attempting to identify a Biblical figure as its first Bishop Eusebius has no one till Theophilus in 189, and that’s when talking about his own Bishopric.

I talked about the origins of the Waldenses in the Smyrna post on my new Prophecy Blog

And I have a post on the evidence that some of the Brythonic Christians (particularly near Wessex) were Baptists. For possible continuity between them and 17th Century Congregationalists and Baptists in England and America look into this list of names. 

Lollardy

Walter Brute

John Clanvowe

John Badby

John Oldcastle

Hawise Mone

Thomas Harding

William Tyndale

Puritans

John Penry

William Wroth

William Thomas

Walter Cradock

Vavasor Powell

William Erbery

William Kiffin

Olchon

Howell Vaughn

Thomas Perry

John Reese Howell

William Vaughan among the first Baptists of Newport Rhode Island

Thomas Dungan a student of William Vaughan founded first Baptist Church in Pennsylvania

Elias Keach Baptized by Thomas Dungan

Midland Connections

Edward Wightman of Burton upon Trent near Shrewsbury

Ezekiel Holliman of Hertfordshire who Baptized Roger Williams

Daniel Wightman of the Second Baptist Church of Newport Rhode Island

George Wightman grandson of Edward immigrated to North Kingston Rhode Island in 1660

Stephen Mumford and his wife Anne of Tewkesbury immigrated to Newport Rhode Island in 1664 and founded the first Seventh Day Baptist Church in America

Valentine Wightman son of George first Pastor of a Baptist Church in Connecticut 

Wait Palmer baptized and ordained by Valentine Wightman

Shubal Stearns baptized and ordained in 1751 by Palmer in Connecticut

Quaker

Dorcas Erbery

Infant Baptism wasn't practiced by the Very Early Church.

The Didache is often considered the earliest Extra Biblical Writing.  Chapter 7 is its instructions for Baptism.

“Chapter 7. Concerning Baptism. And concerning baptism, baptize this way: Having first said all these things, baptize into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living water. But if you have no living water, baptize into other water; and if you cannot do so in cold water, do so in warm. But if you have neither, pour out water three times upon the head into the name of Father and Son and Holy Spirit. But before the baptism let the baptizer fast, and the baptized, and whoever else can; but you shall order the baptized to fast one or two days before.”

And we also see a description of how Baptism works in Justin Martyr’s First Apology chapter 61.

“I will also relate the manner in which we dedicated ourselves to God when we had been made new through Christ; lest, if we omit this, we seem to be unfair in the explanation we are making. As many as are persuaded and believe that what we teach and say is true, and undertake to be able to live accordingly, are instructed to pray and to entreat God with fasting, for the remission of their sins that are past, we praying and fasting with them. Then they are brought by us where there is water, and are regenerated in the same manner in which we were ourselves regenerated. For, in the name of God, the Father and Lord of the universe, and of our Saviour Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, they then receive the washing with water. For Christ also said, Unless you be born again, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. John 3:5 Now, that it is impossible for those who have once been born to enter into their mothers' wombs, is manifest to all. And how those who have sinned and repent shall escape their sins, is declared by Esaias the prophet, as I wrote above; he thus speaks: Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from your souls; learn to do well; judge the fatherless, and plead for the widow: and come and let us reason together, says the Lord. And though your sins be as scarlet, I will make them white like wool; and though they be as crimson, I will make them white as snow. But if you refuse and rebel, the sword shall devour you: for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it. Isaiah 1:16-20

And for this [rite] we have learned from the apostles this reason. Since at our birth we were born without our own knowledge or choice, by our parents coming together, and were brought up in bad habits and wicked training; in order that we may not remain the children of necessity and of ignorance, but may become the children of choice and knowledge, and may obtain in the water the remission of sins formerly committed, there is pronounced over him who chooses to be born again, and has repented of his sins, the name of God the Father and Lord of the universe; he who leads to the laver the person that is to be washed calling him by this name alone. For no one can utter the name of the ineffable God; and if any one dare to say that there is a name, he raves with a hopeless madness. And this washing is called illumination, because they who learn these things are illuminated in their understandings. And in the name of Jesus Christ, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and in the name of the Holy Ghost, who through the prophets foretold all things about Jesus, he who is illuminated is washed.”

In both cases clearly only Baptism of Adults are being described.  If Infant Baptism already existed then some distinctions for how that would obviously work differently would need to be made.  But none of these instructions would need to be different for Adults raised in the Faith after reaching a certain rather than Converts.

Pedo-Baptists try to infer Infant Baptism in various things said by Irenaeus or the Martyrdom of Polycarp or the Shepherd of Hermas but they are all things with other explanations.  

Largely they are tied assumptions about Water Baptism that Credo-Baptists dispute, but I do think those eros actually came first and Infant Baptism is the symptom.  Treating every Biblical reference to Baptism as about Water Baptism when the most important are not about that.  And misunderstanding Colossians as saying Circumcision replaces Baptism when in fact Paul's point is that for both the physical ritual is merely a symbol.

The earliest provable unambiguous references to Infant Baptism are in the Third Century, Tertullian and Origen, then Cyprian the first to really stress it as obligatory.

I agree that the Novatians were Credo-Baptists even though I disagree with them on their defining doctrine, but not the Donatists.

At least some of the Britons were still Credo-Baptists as late as the early 7th Century.

Chie Oneesama, Personified Wisdom

The Book of Proverbs particularly Chapter 8, Matthew 11:19 and Luke 7:35 are the primary Biblical Basis for the concept of a Divine Personified Wisdom.  Both the Hebrew Chokmah and the Greek Sophia are grammatically Feminine hence personified Wisdom being often depicted as a Feminine Human.

Proverbs 7:4 tells us to call Wisdom our Sister.  The two Jesus quotes refer to Believers as children of Wisdom which some use to instead make Sophia a Mother figure.  But the word for Children used there is not the standard Greek word for Son or Daughter or the word for Offspring used in Acts 17, it’s much more vague about the actual familial relationship being implied and often doesn’t inherently imply one at al being just the basic Greek word for child, but it does here due to the possessive pronouns.  It would not be inappropriate in my view for referring to the younger siblings of an older sister.

Chie is a grammatically Feminine Japanese word for Wisdom and Oneesama is the most prestigious of words one would use to address an older sister.  In Anime it’s most often used in a Class S context, as in not a biological relative but a term of endearment for a Senpai you particularly admire.  Hence my Weebified title for this post.

The main internal debate within Christianity about Wisdom is if this title refers to The Holy Spirit or Jesus, Jesus eventually became the mainstream assumption hence bad Septuagint translations of certain Proverbs 8 verses being used to justify a Pre-Incarnate begetting of The Logos before the Creation of the Cosmos.  But one of the first Extra-Biblical expressions of The Trinity was Theophilus of Antioch defining it as The Father, The Logos and Sophia.  Also both Theophilus and Irenaeus seme to identify the Holy Spirit with Sophia in how they interpret Psalm 33:6.

Previously on this Blog I strongly favored The Holy Spirit view, but I don’t think it actually matters that much and Theophilus of Antioch is someone I have mixed opinions on.  So I want to look into it deeper.

First I want make clear that The Holy Spirit has a Feminine aspect whether they’re Wisdom or not The Hebrew word for Spirit is also Grammatically Feminine, the Greek word is technically Gender Neutral but by ending with an A sound it leans towards sounding Feminine especially to Semitic Language trained ears.

The Holy Spirit's Feminine references are so well known that some some think she's only ever Feminine but the title of Parakletos is Masculine.

Jesus also has a Feminine side whether He is Wisdom or not.  He is the Desire of Nations of Haggai 2:7 which is Feminine in the Hebrew.  The Sun of Righteousness of Malachi 4:2 is also a grammatically feminine title in The Hebrew.   And I have argued Shulamith is a type of Jesus not The Church in the Song of Songs.  Also Jesus is called The Image of God which Genesis 1:27 and 5:1-2 define as both Male and Female.  Also a prominent Hebrew word for Salvation is the Feminine form of the name Yeshua.  Luke 2:21 does clearly tell us Jesus’s Incarnate Body (Which He still has) was Assigned Male at Birth, but his Identity is both Male and Female.

The main argument against Jesus being Wisdom would be those quotes I mentioned at the start where He refers to Wisdom in the third person.  But there are other times where He refers to a Title or Aspect of Himself in the Third Person, like all the Son of Man verses.

The verses cited to prove Jesus is Wisdom are 1 Corinthians 1:24 and 30 and 1 Corinthians 2:7 (or the entirety of 1 Corinthians 1:17-2:13) and Colossians 2:3, from what I've found so far at least.  However I don’t get that sense that the Proverbs 8 Personified Wisdom is the point of any of those, in Context Paul is using the word Wisdom explicitly in relation to Greek Philosophy, which it may surprise you to elan didn’t really have a Divine Personified Wisdom concept yet, not in Platonism or Stoicism and certainly not Epicureanism, the Gnostics got that from their Judeo-Christian sources.

It’s also important to remember that the Incarnate Jesus was the Vessel of The Holy Spirit while he walked the Earth and is who sent the Comforter which Proceeds from The Father to us at Pentecost.  So aspects of The Holy Spirit can be said to come from Jesus or be manifested in Jesus.

A lot of my past argument for supporting the Holy Spirit view was verses from The Pentateuch and Isaiah 11:2 that speaks of there being a Spirit of Wisdom and making the Spirit of YHWH the source of Wisdom.  The Pentateuch verses are Exodus 28:3, 31:3, 35:31 and Deuteronomy 34:9. 

However it’s important to remember that God as a whole is Spirit (Spirit in the 1st Century did not mean Immaterial) as shown by John 4:24.  In fact Isaiah 11:2 can be interpreted as a Trinitarian Formula calling each person of The Trinity a Spirit of YHWH.  

But I do think the Spirit of YHWH with a Definite Article typically refers to the Third Person of the Trinity and Revelation 1:4 and 4:5 seem to imply The Holy Spirit has a further Sevenfold division only three of which were singled out in Isaiah.  And Isaiah 11:2 listed the Spirit of Wisdom and Understanding first rather than second or third.

So that leads me to still favoring the Holy Spirit view, but it is ultimately unclear. 

The Sign of The Son of Man

So I recently encountered a Full Preterist arguing that because Jesus called his Resurrection a Sign in Matthew 16:1-4 the General Resurrection isn’t materially the same because it’s not a Sign of something else.

This is one of those arguments I find kind of silly, but I want to respond to it anyway.

First of all I have argued that the “Sign of the Son of Man” in Matthew 24:30 is the General Resurrection of that Dead because of how Jesus used that language back in chapter 16 to refute Pre-Tibbers who argue Matthew 24’s Parousia can’t be the same event as “The Rapture” of 1 Thessalonians 4 and 1 Corinthians 15 because there appears to be no Resurrection there.

But more importantly Jesus does not call His Resurrection a Sign to define it as merely a Sign, the only Sign that generation received is Him doing exactly what He came to do, He’s not doing anything JUST to prove Himself.

I could also get semantical about how the Sign of the Prophet Jonah here is strictly speaking not the Resurrection itself but the time period between death and resurrection being three days.

The entire point of 1 Corinthians 15 is that Jesus' Resurrection is NOT a mere Sign but exactly what The Gospel is.  What makes it a true Evangelion, true Good News, is that it’s not just Jesus, as Jesus was risen so will all those who are Christ’s at his Parousia and ultimately absolutely everyone.

Corporate Body View of the Resurrection

This is a view I’ve seen held by Full Preterists as an alternative way to explain how the General Resurrection of The Dead promised by 1 Corinthians 15, Revelation 20 and other Passages is already Fulfilled.

Now it seems from those I’ve looked at so far to still functionally lead to the exact same Metaphysical conclusion, that our Individual promise of Immortality is as “Spirits” in “Heaven” not our current Fleshy Bodies being made Immortal.  However I could see the exact same Tactics being used by modern Sadducees to deny any kind of After Life at all.

The core argument is taking the Body of Christ Doctrine, particularly how it's expressed in 1 Corinthians 12 and insisting the “Body” discussed in 1 Corinthians 15 is only that Body not individual Bodies.

First of all it is a Lexical Fallacy to insist the word Body must still only refer to the same thing it did earlier, Paul is focusing on a different topic in Chapter 15.

But regardless of that what Paul means by all Believers being the Body of Christ is specifically our Physical Bodies, our Flesh.  That’s why his argument against Prostitution in 1 Corinthians 6:15-16 is that the Members of Christ should not be joined to a Harlot.  Each individual Body is a Member of the Body of Christ the same way our Limbs are Members of our individual bodies.  Romans 12:4-5 says the same thing.

The Body of Christ Doctrine is derived from the Bride of Christ Doctrine, we are One Flesh with Christ the same way Husband and Wife are One Flesh.

And it’s also tied to us being The Temple of God which Paul starts laying out in 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 and returns to in Chapter 6:19-20.  In John 2:21 the individual Incarnate Body of Jesus is called “the Temple of His Body”.  In Paul  both each Individual body is the Temple of God and all of our Bodies are Collectively The Temple of God.  2 Peter 1:13-14 also refers to each individual body as a Tabernacle as does Paul in 2 Corinthians 5:1-4.

So The Corporate Body of Christ can only be said to be risen if Each and Every Individual Body is Risen.

They also focus on the fact that the word Body is only ever used in a singular form in 1 Corinthians 15.  This is a misunderstanding of how Language works, Paul is keeping most of the language Singular so each individual can feel like they are being individually spoken to on some level.  It is a message for everyone which means each individual.

To simply read 1 Corinthians 15 and try to force it to only be using the word Body in some legal sense and not about carnal bodies being buried and then risen is absurd.  That is not the natural impression any of this Language gives no matter how Paul used the word Body earlier.